Flyers GM Chuck Fletcher sparks outrage with comments on Joel Quenneville.

What a huge mistake.

HockeyFeed
HockeyFeed
Published 4 years ago
Flyers GM Chuck Fletcher sparks outrage with comments on Joel Quenneville.
Jose F. moreno / AP

Newly appointed Philadelphia Flyers general manager Chuck Fletcher may have just made the first major misstep of his tenure as the Flyers GM.

 As every single Philadelphia Flyers fan will know by now the Flyers were seriously linked to former Chicago Blackhawks head coach Joel Quenneville earlier in the season. Those rumors surfaced after former Flyers general manager Ron Hextall was fired and replaced by Fletcher and after Fletcher had made the decision to fire former Flyers head coach Dave Hakstol. In fact the rumors revolving around the Flyers and Quenneville became so loud that there were even reports that the two sides had already put an agreement in place that would be consummated at the end of the 2018 - 2019 National Hockey League regular season.

That being said those rumors would obviously never come to pass and it was eventually announced that Quenneville would instead become the next head coach of the Florida Panthers organization. It was obviously a huge blow to the Flyers who will almost assuredly be unable to find a coach of Quenneville's caliber to take over as their next head coach, but at least they gave it their best shot right? Well not so fast. 

On Monday Fletcher spoke to the media following the announcement that Quenneville had officially signed with the Florida Panthers and unsurprisingly one of the questions directed at him was about this very topic. The response from Fletcher however left the members of the media in attendance quite surprised and has sparked outrage among the Flyers fan base, a very bad thing for a general manager that has not even been in place for an entire season.

According to a report from Philadelphia Flyers insider Sam Carchidi of the Philadelphia Inquirer, Fletcher informed him that he did not so much as contact Joel Quenenville. It was a truly staggering revelation from the Flyers general manager and one that has immediately raised questions about whether or not Fletcher is even doing his due diligence while looking for a new head coach for the Flyers organization. Needless to say the normally calm and understanding Flyers fan base has reacted with pure vitriol to this announcement, with many fans already calling for Fletcher to be fired just a few short weeks after being hired in the first place.

Now I will say that Fletcher may merely be playing coy after losing out on a big time free agent like Quenneville, but if that is indeed the case the backlash he has caused was certainly not worth preserving his secret. 

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